Open sourcers are proving they can beat the best minds that Jobs’ Mob has on offer. The Ubuntu 13.04 performance with Intel's open-source graphics driver is now easily surpassing Apple's OpenGL driver found in OS X 10.8.3.

A team of open sourcers has been tinkering with the OpenGL graphics and gaming performance for an older Intel Core i5 "Sandy Bridge" Apple system. Playing around with an Apple Mac Mini bearing an Intel Core i5 2415M Sandy Bridge processor with 2GB of RAM and using Intel HD 3000 graphics, they benchmarked their results.

The OS X 10.8.3 was tested in its stock configuration and compared to Ubuntu 13.04. Ubuntu 13.04 was benchmarked in its stock configuration of the Linux 3.8 kernel, xf86-video-intel 2.21.6, and Mesa 9.1.1 driver. The latest Linux kernel (Linux 3.10 Git) and Mesa Git (Mesa 9.2.0 git-ccb041f) were installed for a second run atop Ubuntu 13.04 to get an idea for the latest state of Intel's Linux OpenGL driver.

According to Phoronix all benchmarking on each operating system was handled in a fully automated and reproducible manner using the open-source Phoronix Test Suite benchmarking software. The selection of OpenGL games benchmarked were limited to those that could run sufficiently on the Intel HD 3000 graphics hardware and where the game ports are of similar quality under Linux and OS X.

The result was that the Linux machine cleaned Apple’s clock. When testing the high quality visuals within Xonotic, Ubuntu 13.04 was 32 per cent faster than OS X 10.8.3. When pulling in the latest Intel Linux graphics driver code, the open-source platform was 40 per cent faster than the latest OS X release and 8 per cent faster than the April configuration of Ubuntu 13.04.

Valve will be moving to make Steam available for Linux, as has been rumored for some time now. It really isn’t that much of a leap when you figure that the company already has made Steam available for Mac OS X, and Linux would be the next logical frontier for Steam.

To start off with, what we know is that the Linux version of Steam right now has three main goals, which are: first, getting the Steam client working on Linux with full functionality; next, getting Left for Dead 2 running on Linux at high frame rates using OpenGL; and finally, porting additional Valve titles over to Linux.

The initial plan calls for Valve to only support the Ubuntu version of Linux; but once it has that sorted out, it will start looking into supporting other Linux distros, but that is down the road.

Steam support for Linux could present some very interesting possibilities for developers, but it is very hard to say how much support there will be for games for Linux. It has to start someplace, however, and Steam could be just the ticket to getting this moving forward. Valve had no announced timetable when they expect this to be released, but they are working on it, which is the good news for Linux fans.

Oracle’s Sun Java JDK packages are to be removed from the Ubuntu partner repositories and disabled on users systems after Larry Ellison ruled that the retiring the ‘Operating System Distributor License for Java, means Canonical no longer have permission to use it.

The change will affect Ubuntu 10.04 LTs, Ubuntu 10.10 and 11.04 users only. Those who have ‘sun-java-6? package installed on their system will see it removed via a future software update. It is not clear when this will be yet.

Canonical are saying that anyone requiring the software will need to switch to open-source alternatives. This can be found in the Ubuntu Software Centre or by manually installing the Java packages available through the Oracle web site.

OpenJDK, which until now has been the open-source alternatives to Java, will now become its official implementation. Oracle is using OpenJDK as the basis for their own future releases.

The problem is not Oracle trying to stick one to the Open Source movement. There are shedloads of security issues present in the versionof Java available through the Ubuntu partner repositories. Canonical just thinks that the security risk was so severe that it is easier to kill it off.

A security update for the Sun JDK browser plugin will disable the plugin on all machines. Ubuntu’s Marc Deslauriers wrote in a mail to the Ubuntu Security Mailing list that its actions will mitigate users’ risk from malicious websites exploiting the vulnerable version of the Sun JDK.

Canonical is claiming a victory after the maker of expensive printer Ink, HP signed up to use Ubuntu to run its OpenStack clouds. Canonical CEO Jane Silber announced that Ubuntu is a good choice for OpenStack clouds as it is both flexible and scalable as a guest OS, while also being a secure host system.

HP joined the open source cloud group in July of this year and last month, the company announced a private beta programme for HP Cloud Services. It uses OpenStack's Compute (Nova) and Object Storage (Swift) technology.

OpenStack is an open source cloud platform and has more than 100 member companies, including AMD, Canonical, Cisco, Citrix, Dell, HP and Intel. Ubuntu is a fading star in the Linux world, so its choice by a big name like HP is good news for the outfit.

Canonical's Mark Shuttleworth has decided that the next release of the Linux operating system, Ubuntu 11.04, will use Unity as the default desktop interface.

While based on GNOME, it is Canonical's own take on what an interface should look and act like. Shuttleworth said that "users want Unity as their primary desktop" and that Ubuntu had "A lot of work to do around windows management but that it would become the default" when they're sure that it will work.”

Ubuntu Unity will default to either a single window, single foreground application on netbooks, or a multiple windows, multi-foreground interface on a desktop or laptop. Users can still use the GNOME desktop or the closest thing GNOME has to Unity, the GNOME Shell if they really want. Shuttleworth is sure they won't.

Canonical have released Ubuntu 10.10 yesterday which also happened to be the 10th day of the 10th month. The new OS release seems to be focused on lower resolution netbooks, with a better interface, 2GB of free online storage, and even multi-touch support.

However after the last major update, this version of Ubuntu looks a bit tame. The installer has been revamped, though the changes are for the most part cosmetic. Some menus appear to have changed. Unfortunately, the actual install process still means that you have to dump everything onto a single partition. Which is something other versions of Linux do not require.

When booted up, 10.10 doesn't look radically different from the previous release it does have a number of very subtle improvements to the default theme. Application windows have smoother gradients, window buttons have been enlarged and refined, and the default Humanity icon set has seen a slight makeover.

The most noticeable change in Ubuntu 10.10 is the Ubuntu Software Centre, which has a History option in the side menu, showing all package installations, removals, and upgrades by date.

Dubbed Maverick Meerkat the CD sized ISO can be downloaded directly from the Ubuntu homepage. While it is worthwhile if you are using Ubuntu it is not much to write home about.